The welcome makes sense only against what France had already spent. In April 1917 the Nivelle offensive traded 134,000 French casualties for a ridge it never took, and the army broke — mutinies touched nearly half the French infantry divisions on the Western Front. Pétain took over and stopped attacking. By then France had buried more than a million men. Then the Americans landed: 14,000 in France by June 1917, over a million by May 1918, two million by the Armistice. To a villager in 1918, the man in the strange helmet was not simply an ally. He was evidence the war could still be won.

The set is two figures on one base. The villager — an older man in a soft cap and waistcoat — has taken the doughboy by both arms and is looking straight up into his face. The American is still loaded for the road: full marching pack with the blanket roll, rifle slung muzzle-up, M1917 helmet, wrap puttees. He hasn't put anything down yet. Note who is doing the greeting; the young men of this village are at the front, or dead. It anchors a village diorama — put the woman blessing the column as it passes across the street, with the doughboy at rest on his rifle and the doughboy in his greatcoat waiting for the order to move.

W. Britain model 23128. 1/30 scale (approximately 60mm), matte-painted metal. Two-figure set on a single sculpted groundwork base. Boxed.